The present invention relates to automatic systems and techniques for improving the security of the storage of firearms and other object, more generally, that either are dangerous in unauthorized hands or are valuable to the owner or custodian; and also to aiding in the tracking and recovery of such if unauthorizedly removed from, or not appropriately returned to, such storagexe2x80x94and, additionally, to alerting schools and other locations automatically of the approach of an intruder with the stolen firearm.
The art is replete with techniques for monitoring the securing or storage or location of objects of varied types, and for detecting and providing an alarm upon the withdrawal or removal of such objects from their intended location or repository. Examples of varied radio-wave system monitoring applications are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,818,998 and 5,917,423 for recovering stolen vehicles, the so-called LoJack(copyright) systems; in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,804,943, 5,680,105 and 5,686,892 for items of personal property; and in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,805,105, 5,183,951 and 5,852,401, relating generally to radio beacon and similar location systems.
A primary application of interest in connection with the present invention, however, is the before-mentioned security of firearms, and the addressing of the growing concerns of firearm theft and gun violence. The legitimate gun owner is seldom the one most likely to commit an act of violence with a firearm. It is their stolen firearms, however, that end up in the hands of those who commit crimes against society. It has become a fact of a gun owner""s life that if his or her firearms are indeed stolen and used to commit a crime, they can be held responsible. There have been attempts in the past, accordingly, to tie the gun owner""s vault to a security system and patented examples of such systems will be later detailed. While effective in varying degrees, such systems do not address the problem of locating the stolen firearms. If, indeed, a burglar knows that a house is equipped with a security system, usually the first order of business is to disable it. If a thief has already disarmed the security system, the system attached to the firearms vault is generally disabled also. There then remains the problem of locating the stolen weapons afterwards. If the gun owner""s house is in a remote region, it will take law enforcement officials a long time to get there even if the security system does work. Theoretically the police could pass the fleeing suspect on their way to the crime, never knowing it was the thiefs.
The system of the present invention, therefore, has been designed to address not only improved security, but also the recovery of the stolen firearms, providing the police with information, for example, that a stolen gun is in a stolen car that they are about to approach.
The invention is not, however, the first approach to the use of radio-wave monitoring and alarm systems to warn of the removal of a firearm from its stored location or repository; such being addressed, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,530,451, 5,196,827, 5,416,472, 5,525,966 and 5,598,151, and a tie-in with security and central alarm systems has also previously been proposed, as in, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,416,472, 5,821,855, 5,828,301 and 5,841,346. Inventory checking and control has also been proposed as, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,786,764 and 5,798,693.
None of these approaches , however, provides adjustable for the security monitoring and identifying of the firearm in its intended storage facility or repository, but, in the event of failure to intercept the breach of security at the storage facility, none provides continuing identification tagging and tracking thereafter of a transceiver-equipped stolen firearm, including during the police efforts to recover the stolen firearm; and none provides for the security of a school or other building in automatically detecting the approach of such a stolen firearm to their premises.
It is accordingly a principal object of the invention to provide such a new and improved method of and system for securing firearms in their storage facility or repository; and, if unauthorizedly removed therefrom, enabling continuing tracking, for ultimate recovery thereof with identification of that particular firearm, and, in addition, to provide automatic warning to a school or other building or location of the approach of the stolen firearm upon its premises.
A further object is to provide such a novel system for identifiably tracking and/or alerting to the approach of other stolen or otherwise removed objects, as well.
Other and further objects will be explained hereinafter and are more particularly delineated in the appended claims.
In summary, however, and in connection with the firearm application of the invention, the invention embraces a method of monitoring the security of stored firearms and the like and enabling the tracking of their unauthorized removal, that comprises, embedding within each firearm a battery-operable microprocessor-controlled radio transmitter-receiver transceiver, normally quiescent when the firearm is properly stored, and code-identified for the particular firearm; monitoring the storage of the firearms, upon detection of an unauthorized removal of a firearm from storage, enabling the police or other tracking of radio transmissions from the transmitter of the transceiver, so code-identified; and equipping schools, public buildings and other locations with receivers responsive to said radio transmissions for providing an automatic warning to them of the approach of the stolen firearm, as by a bearer, in the vicinity of such a location.
Preferred and best mode designs and implementations of the invention are later detailed.